Just Around The Riverbend
by Scribbler
Summary: SatAM fic. Bunnie talks to the river about things she can't say to her friends. The river never answers her, though. Crossover with Spirited Away.


**Disclaimer: **Not mine, never were.

**A/N: **Written for Insanepurin as part of the Boiz and Gurlz ficlet-request meme on LiveJournal. She requested a Spirited Away/SatAM crossover featuring Haku and Bunnie. Please do _NOT_ tell me this is not long enough or not a real fic. It is a _ONE SHOT_ and intended to be only a snippet of a possible situation that might occur if these two universes interacted.

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_J_**_ust Around The Riverbend_**

© Scribbler, January 2008.

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_I look once more  
Just around the riverbend,  
Beyond the shore,  
Where the gulls fly free.  
Don't know what for,  
Or what I dream the day might send  
Just around the riverbend  
For me._

-- From _Just Around The Riverbend © Disney's Pocahontas._

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The river that flowed through Knothole had never been called anything except that: the river. Sometimes you could hear a capital letter in there – The River - as if it was _the_ river, the only one on Mobius. Mostly, though, it was just the river, where beasts swam and fished and skimmed stones until they figured out that was impossible across running water.

Boating was another favourite hobby, though only in the Summer months. Kits made paper ships to race, or stood on the bridge and dropped sticks in, then rushed to the other side to see which appeared first. The river was a source of food, play and comfort, since it reminded everyone that life didn't stand still to fester the way Robotnik wanted it to. The river kept moving no matter the season, washing away impurities and constantly renewing itself. Pollution sometimes came this far, but the river never let it stay. Some days it seemed like nothing could touch or change the river except the river itself.

Sally liked to stand on the bridge and watch it flow. It calmed her, helping her organise her thoughts. Sonic liked to show his prowess by catching fish in it. Antoine practising swordplay on the shoreline, while Rotor worked on ways to harness its power to help the village and Tails splashed about in the shallows like a little kit should. They all gravitated to the river at some point in their day.

Bunnie went there to remind herself things weren't permanent. She admired the river, pulled flotsam from the reeds and worked crud from where it was caught between rocks, keeping things clean when even the river itself couldn't. She sat on a rock downstream of Knothole and talked to nobody in particular about things she couldn't even tell Sally-girl: how she feared she'd never be normal again, never find the kind of fairytale love Sally and Sonic had, never meet anyone who only saw her metal limbs or only saw what she'd been like before she got them. She talked about hopes and dreams and uncertainties, and afterwards she felt better, as though by speaking them aloud she'd scraped them out of herself like scraping terrapod droppings off her feet.

Sometimes going to that spot was like reminding herself who she was underneath what Robotnik and this guerrilla war had done to her. Her identity was divided – flesh, blood and bone or metal, wire casings and pressure sensors? They occupied equal amounts of her body, so which half was really her these days – the little rabbit with the fluffiest tail in the Southlands, who used to dream of being a hairdresser and raising a family, or Bunnie Rabbot, Freedom Fighter who dreamed of overthrowing Robotnik and setting the world to rights?

Once or twice she waded into the water, just the shallows at first, then deeper until she felt the cold wetting the fur above her waistline and could fool herself that her legs had just gone numb with cold. Those times were few and far between; afterwards she crawled out on all fours and sobbed as she dried in the sun, river-water gently lapping her steel toes.

She didn't go with Sonic and the others when they sailed downstream. She always kind of regretted that, as though somewhere just out of sight were answers to questions she didn't even know she wanted to ask. More than once she considered setting out alone, but something always came up – a vital mission, an injury, some catastrophe that meant she couldn't be spared. Then she'd steal a few moments from her day to go to her special spot and stare across the water, saying nothing but wishing and wondering so hard it almost _hurt_. Could she be someone different away from here? She'd never leave Knothole, too many creatures depended on her to use her unique abilities in heir fight for freedom, but the idea remained. Who would she be if she travelled downriver and stared into the water on a different bank? Would she be the same, or would she be like the river, always 'the river' no matter where it was or how it looked?

"I ain't sayin' I don't believe we can beat Robotnik," she confessed one Winter's morning, wrapped tight in a coat of synthetic fibres worm through at the elbows. There was a stiff breeze with sleet in it that made her squint. "Just that some days it seems harder n' most. S'easier to have faith when the sun's shinin', y'know what I mean?"

A bubble popped on the water's surface. For a second Bunnie could almost believe she saw a face there – a pointed canine snout that formed words whipped away by the wind. She shook her head, shivering, and hunched further down in her coat.

She didn't say goodbye. Who was there to say goodbye to? Still, as she turned to go back upstream she raised a hand in farewell because she always did. It was a little ritual she couldn't remember starting but carried on with regardless.

Behind her the river kept on flowing, because that was what the river did, and would continue to do after she and all the Freedom Fighters were worm-food and yet another generation had passed without naming it.

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_**Fin.**_

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End file.
